Securing Tomorrow: Cybersecurity Trends for Businesses in 2024

As cybersecurity is evolving to combat all kinds of threats, cyber-attacks have also been growing exponentially. In this blog we will discuss the best cybersecurity practices to follow in 2024.

The grave reality in today’s world is that cybersecurity is severely underestimated by businesses until they are targeted by such attacks and the nature of cyberattacks is usually so adverse that it hugely impacts the business productivity and reputation. If cutting-edge technologies like Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are being incorporated in cybersecurity surfaces, they are also being employed in attack surfaces, which highlights the need to consistently update cybersecurity strategies.

For businesses who are aware of this grave reality, they are consistently employing their cybersecurity teams to enhance data recovery practices apart from building resilience against such attacks. In a study conducted by Deloitte Centre for Controllership, around 48% of the top-level executives said that they expect the number of cyberattacks on their organization’s financial data estates to increase each year.

Let us explore the most common cybersecurity trends in 2024, that are expected to rule the cybersecurity landscape.

The Evolution of Cybercrime in 2024

Before we get to building resilience from such crimes, let us briefly explore how cyberattacks have and will evolve, to better equip organizations with cybersecurity protocols.

The Adverse Effects of Generative AI: As productive generative AI has proved to be for the masses, there has been a dark side to its benefits as well. Generative AI is being used for malicious intent. Intelligent automated malware that can skip detection and socially engineered deepfakes are the top cybercrimes that have been employing generative AI.

Sophisticated Phishing Attacks: AI-powered deepfake frauds and phishing attacks have been evolving to attack the financial sector. Around 81% organizations have faced a monumental increase in phishing attacks after March in 2023. They have and will continue to evolve in their delivery methods, rendering the organizational training for protection against phishing attacks useless.

IoT Cyber Attacks: With household and industrial devices now connected to the internet due to Internet of Things (IoT), the focus has been on the convenience IoT provides instead of safe practices for data sharing. Cybercrime has picked up this vulnerability in the IoT landscape and will benefit from weak security protocols. Personal and professional data is at stake due to this weak spot in cybersecurity.

Top Cybersecurity Trends to Lookout For in 2024

The need for a shift in perspective on cybersecurity as just a security measure to treating it as a strategic priority has proven to be immense, due to the predicted cost of cyberattacks, on the global economy, going beyond $10.5 trillion. Cybersecurity needs to be implemented on personal, organizational, and even governmental levels, because every aspect, from personal data to financial data and top-secret strategies is at stake in today’s day and age. Listed below are the emerging trends in cybersecurity that will reshape cyber-protection in 2024:

Focusing More on Cyber Resilience: Despite the term being used interchangeably with cybersecurity, there is a lot of difference between the two concepts. Whereas cyber security just focuses on protecting against cyber-attacks, cyber resilience aims at implementing strategies that ensure business continuity in case of a cyber-attack. Cyber resilience is attuned to the reality that no security strategy ensures 100% protection against cyber-attacks. Therefore, maintaining the ability to continue business operations and minimizing data loss is one of the top trends in cybersecurity.

Shortage of Cybersecurity Skillset: This trend can be accounted to two factors i.e., underestimating the importance of cybersecurity and the ever-evolving nature of cyber-attacks. Around 54% of professionals in the cybersecurity avenue believe that shortage of skills has had a negative impact. Cybersecurity is already a difficult profession, with constantly increasing attack surfaces and the underestimation of the actual job, hence the shortage of this skill set is projected to be dominant theme in 2024, which organizations will have to deal with.

Regulatory Practices in Cyber Security: Amidst rising privacy concerns, regulations will become more complex and complicated, implemented by local and international authorities. These are expected to be conflicting or even overlapping in their nature, which companies will have to navigate wisely in 2024.

Role of Generative AI in Cyber Security: Just like it has transformed the rest of the world, generative AI has also been transforming the cybersecurity landscape. Some common use cases that are already being implemented are real-time anomaly-detection, intelligent authentication, and automated incident reporting. Generative AI is also being employed to generate synthetic training data sets for machine learning models for preventing phishing attacks. It will also be employed in procuring proactive security strategies and allow analytics in generating attack simulation to test security strategies.

Conducting Regular Cybersecurity Audits: Conducting an in-depth analysis of organizational security infrastructure must be an ode to mitigating the underestimation of the importance of cybersecurity in 2024. Organizations need to establish a set criterion after a security audit, which will be employed by individuals and teams to establish an organization-wide defense strategy against continuous cyberattacks. These audits need to be yearly at least, but experts recommend it biannually if the organization is dealing with big data.

Implement the Latest Cybersecurity Practices with Dynamics Solutions and Technology

Cybersecurity has been becoming increasingly complicated, with every passing year. Microsoft Security provides a robust suite of security applications that cater to various security needs for business organizations. From application security to server and cloud security, choosing from their extensive suite of applications can be daunting for organizations investing for the first time in their security infrastructure.

Choosing an implementation partner, who can curate security infrastructure end-to-end by implementing a custom-built cybersecurity application that caters to specific business security requirements, becomes essential. Dynamics Solution and Technology emerges as a steadfast security ally for business organizations worldwide. As Microsoft’s Gold and Solutions partner, we have been digitally securing businesses across the Gulf and MENA regions. Our range of digitally transformed and secure clientele is a testament to our unwavering commitment to excellence.

Contact us today to gage which Microsoft Security solution is best fit for your needs and get on to secure your data estates today!